Iraq announces execution of 7 al-Qaeda terrorists

Iraqi officials have announced the execution of seven convicted al-Qaeda terrorists of various Arab nationalities.

Dakhel Radhi, a provincial council member of Iraq’s southern Dhi Qar province, noted that the terrorists, who were from some Arab countries including Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, Sudan, and Jordan, had been arrested over four years ago.

He added the death sentences were carried out “by hanging” in Nasiriyah prison on Wednesday.

Another provincial official noted that some 60 other convicted al-Qaeda members were currently awaiting execution in the same jail, which is located in the provincial capital Nasiriyah.

On August 21, Iraq hung 36 men convicted of involvement in the massacre of hundreds of military recruits in the central city of Tikrit in June 2014.

This file photo taken on April 4, 2015 shows Iraqi fighters and members of Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Units praying at a burial site believed to hold victims of a June 2014 massacre – named the Speicher massacre after the nearby base from which the mostly Shia recruits were abducted – in which hundreds of army cadets were executed by the Daesh, in the city of Tikrit. (AFP)

On June 12, 2014, the Takfiri Daesh terrorists killed about 1,700 Iraqi Air Force cadets in an attack on Camp Speicher, a former US base. There were reportedly about 4,000 unarmed cadets in the camp at the time of the attack. About 400 of the victims were from Dhi Qar.

An investigative committee later revealed that 57 members of slain dictator Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath party aided the Daesh terrorists in the massacre.